


ReCalculated: Green

by Celestios



Category: NCT (Band), Real Person Fiction
Genre: Age Play, Age Play AU, Age Play Little Mark Lee, Age Play Middle Johnny Seo, Anxiety, Caregivers, Dark, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Don't Like Don't Read, Dubious Morality, Forced Ageplay, Forced Infantilism, Infantilism, Just dub-con elements, Little Lee Taeyong, Little Mark Lee, Littles AU, Littles that have no rights, Mentions of Dying Young, Middle Johnny Seo, More tags to be added, Multi, NO rape, No romantic ships for Littles please, No sexual ships for Littles please, Non-Consensual Infantilism, Non-Consensual Punishments, Non-Consensual Spanking, Non-Sexual Age Play, Reincarnation, Reincarnation AU, Spanking, Trigger Warnings, Wetting, and non-con age play, daddy - Freeform, dub-con, mommy, non-consensual age play, talk of death, thumb sucking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:33:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25415485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celestios/pseuds/Celestios
Summary: Johnny thinks he might’ve been a college student.  He thinks and he thinks and he thinks until he remembers that he will probably never remember.That is the curse of being born again.At least, that is the burden he bears.AKAIn a society where those who are reincarnated as Littles, with no memory of who they are, Johnny tries to make sense of the world around him that takes no questions, no exceptions while also staying by his little brother, Mark’s, side. But their society is just one of many and Johnny thinks he can figure it out. Johnny thinks too much.
Relationships: Mark Lee & Suh Youngho | Johnny
Comments: 4
Kudos: 54





	1. Coffee

**Author's Note:**

> Please do not read if you don’t like. Do not read or comment if you don’t like it. Please mind the tags! And if there’s anything else you think I should tag please let me know! I will tag anything you think I should!

Johnny thinks he might’ve been a college student. 

It’s the only explanation really. As to why he has such dry sarcasm, witty replies, why he hates drinking only water. Sometimes they drink juice, but it’s all the same to him. He thinks maybe he used to drink. He doesn’t remember drinking, or any of his past life, but he thinks maybe he must have. Because he knows what alcohol is, maybe he knows what kind he’d like if he had some. He knows about bottles and glasses and ounces, so he must have in a past life. He knows about coffee, too, something they’re strictly not allowed to have. He knows what it looks like, knows the scent of it. So maybe, he used to drink coffee, too. College student or not, there was some form of caffeine in his life. 

But he doesn’t crave it. Doesn’t have headaches, doesn’t think about it unless he’s obsessing with the past like he always does, head pressing up against the wall or chin resting in his palm. He thinks and he thinks and he thinks until he remembers that he will probably never remember.

That is the curse of being born again. 

At least, that is the burden he bears. 

And it is his burden alone. The others don’t seem to listen to him or pay him any mind, really. They’re not supposed to. They’re not supposed to listen to him ramble the way he does, or watch him pace the way he paces, back and forth, feet hammering into the old wood of the floorboards of their bedroom. At first, he had stopped when asked. Then he had stopped when yelled at. Then he had ignored their consistent pleas, their little whines, feet drumming out the noise of their voices, and the tones of their threats. And then, Johnny had been left to his own devices. 

One

After one

After one

All alone. 

Just by himself. 

Until Mark had moved to the bed next to his and he’d actually listened to Johnny. He didn’t nod along and hum in agreement or study Johnny with his eyes when he’d first told him about the lies or the questions. He’d just shrugged and let him go on and on and at the end he’d asked Johnny if he wanted to brush his teeth together. Johnny had told him no but Mark didn’t seem to mind. He’d disliked Mark until he then realized that he  _ couldn’t  _ dislike Mark. The simple excusing of Johnny’s words were not what he thought they were. Mark wasn’t ignoring him. 

Mark was accepting him. 

Johnny brushes his teeth with Mark every night.

And even though Johnny still gets punished all the time—chores, extra quiet time, spanking, loss of privileges—he doesn’t stop. He doesn’t stop talking to Mark or questioning his Elders and he doesn’t leave Mark alone. Ever. 

At first it had just been courtesy. Mark, Johnny thinks, might have died young. He could tell. He can always really tell. Johnny has been here so long that he can tell by the way people act, by their mindsets, how far along in life they’d been. Most of the time. But they don’t listen to him and he at least has the common courtesy not to tell people what’s really going on once he’s figured it out. Not the full truth anyway. And he could but he can’t with Mark. 

Mark is a  _ baby _ , he thinks, at least  _ now _ . And when he’d passed and been born again, he couldn’t have been very old or very experienced, either. Johnny is pretty sure you cannot come back older than your past life, so Mark had to have been this young.

Mark is sweet and bubbly; not the decent kind that will get you places in life but genuinely so sweet that it hurts Johnny’s teeth sometimes. Naivety, in the sense, but yet he’s  _ not _ . He can’t be. He’s a lawful kind of good, doesn’t question the rules or the Elders, does what he’s asked. He’s a little too loud, too happy, too excited for Johnny but over time, Johnny loses the irritation and maybe even the jealousy that goes with that and learns to see through Mark’s eyes just a bit. 

Mark is the sweetheart that everyone wants and everyone cares for. He plays with the stupid toys they give him and finishes all his test and eats a bit too messy so that things end up on his face. Caregivers are lined up to spoil him—and yet there he remains, by Johnny’s side, often slipping into bed with him too much for comfort. Because Johnny is safe and warm, he says. And Mark wants to be safe and warm. Johnny thinks he needs it though he says nothing, and neither does Mark. This makes no one in charge happy—but what can they do? Mark is good, truly good. He is perfect. And the fact that he’s attached to Johnny at the  _ hip _ ? The world doesn’t know  _ what  _ to do with them. They are truly a pair that no one was ready for. Because whether or not Johnny or Mark know that they are protecting one another, they are. There is no Mark without Johnny and no Johnny without Mark. As long as it’s taken Johnny to admit that. There isn’t. 

Even though, there have been times that was almost the case. He’s heard the Elders talking about how truly cherished someone like Mark is, and how there are plenty of caregivers interested in him. Whenever adoption day comes, they always talk to Mark, who’s more than happy to engage in conversation or play. And during observation day, Mark is as cheerful and cooperative as always. Until he gets the idea that he has to be away from Johnny. 

And then there is nothing but a  _ storm _ left in the shell of the person he once used to be. Or might’ve been. Johnny doesn’t know. 

It’s usually up to the Littles if they want to go with the new caregivers that come to see them, to adopt them, to promise them love and adoration. But sometimes, it isn’t, and they have to go away anyway if the case is complicated or special. Not Johnny—he thinks that he’s too old, not little enough and definitely too haunted to be adopted. The caregivers come and they see him and he gives them one look before the Elders will come and shoo them away to look at another cute Little and not Johnny. Johnny is grateful for this. Although, he hates when the soft little lies come out of their mouths. 

“He’s just so shy these days, but he can be a good boy,” some of them say and Johnny doesn’t know if it’s a lie they tell or if they truly believe it. He doesn’t care so much as to find out. They used to try so hard to get him to be open and get him adopted but that had soon faded. It’s more of a “if it happens it happens” mindset for them now, he thinks. But for himself? He doubts it. But for Mark? People  _ long _ for a Little like Mark.

And one day they try to sign the paperwork under both of their noses, and Mark throws a fit about having to leave Johnny so bad they need to call security. Mark bites the person that was supposed to be his new mommy so hard that Johnny knows she must still have the scars. Mark cries so much that Johnny can feel the pain he must’ve felt in a past life, and it haunts him when he hides under the covers of his bed that night, unable to face Mark when he prods his arm with a finger. Johnny’s never felt so much before. And so that is why there is no Johnny without Mark. And no Mark without Johnny. 

Mark will not allow it. 

So they spend their days together, all of them, and Johnny often wonders just how much longer they  _ do _ have before something like that will happen again. He counts the days and then he adds them and then he throws it all away because in the end he’s not sure if it  _ does _ matter. Johnny is 23. Mark is 19. This means nothing. Not when the Elders are hundreds of years old, and caregivers that come to see them, in between. Johnny knows that in this day and age because of their new lives in this weird, societal hell, that they are still infants. That they can fend for themselves if taught, but they haven’t  _ been _ taught. Johnny doesn’t  _ remember _ a world in which they could’ve been taught. He doesn’t  _ remember _ the  _ world.  _ They probably were at some point, and then something had happened, and they’d ended up here, confused, alone, and so very scared. Mentally and physically. But Johnny doesn’t leave, he can’t leave. That would be worse. That would make him a runaway. 

No one would defend him. Just like nobody listens.

And if he’s died in his past life, he’d like to know where and when and why. And maybe how. He’d like to know whether or not he’d ever  _ had _ a normal life. He  _ thinks _ they all used to.

Whatever a normal life  _ is _ . 

And maybe he’d like to know why this is happening and why they’re kept like meek little sheep. What  _ is _ the point of all this? They tell him that it’s to keep him safe, to raise him until he’s ready to be released out into the world, but he’s not sure he buys it. Johnny can count and do math and use technology and maybe if he were allowed near a stove, he could cook. He could learn labor, he could learn more things, instead of being tested once a month on his fine and gross motor skills, on his analyzation skills, on weird shapes and colors he lies about. He knows he’s smart. He knows he was smart before, too.

He knows Mark is smart, too, but no one says a thing about it. They often don’t, not to Johnny, and when they do it’s usually in the form of scolding. They don’t belittle him, and  _ he _ doesn’t belittle  _ them _ too often. He remembers how hard it had been waking up after being reborn, into this world. He remembers the confusion of waking up and not knowing who you are or where you are, the sheer utter inability to understand the world around him, or how his skin had felt like it was on fire. He remembers the pain. He doesn’t know if anyone else does. 

And there are often memories that come and go in flitting images, moments of times, passing by in his dreams, he thinks. He remembers the smell of tea, the feel of fire on his face from roasting marshmallows. That’s it. He sees things in his dreams, streets, cars, overhead lights of city buildings, but he’s not so sure if they’re completely manifested or if they’re real. A part of him argues that they  _ have _ to be real, memories from a longer time ago, his past life. The brain cannot simply make things up, it needs to take from what it knows. But when he tells Mark about this, he just gets a shrug and a “I dream about two-legged ladybugs.”

It doesn’t matter how much of it  _ is _ real or fake or memories or actually manifested imagination from his make-believe fairytales of a normal life. He knows that even with so-called flashbacks, he will  _ never _ remember who he was or where he’s come from. No one ever has. 

And he thinks that they make sure of that.

When he does begin to question, even the little things, even the tiny moments, they tell him to relax and to not upset the others, but the others don’t  _ talk _ to him, so he’s not sure how long they can keep that up. But he does know one thing. He can’t keep it up for much longer either. So after time, an equilibrium of peace is met, and they exist throughout their days together, the same thing day after day, of reading and writing and coloring in the lines and pacing around the old, rickety floors, and huddling together under a blanket despite being scolded for doing so. Just Mark and Johnny. 

There is no Johnny without Mark and there is no Mark without Johnny. 


	2. Yellow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Hyung,” he nudges Johnny with a socked foot, “yellow, please.”
> 
> Xuxi comes to visit and Johnny gets all the reassurance he's needed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for anxiety and talk of ghosting and mistreating a friend

Johnny sleeps, but he sleeps light. Over time, he’s gotten used to the flickering of the lights on and off outside of the bedroom they all share, of hearing hushed whispers and voices long and drawn out, often to soothe the pain of a newcomer. New littles are often so bemused by their own existence and terrified of the Elders that it’s normal for things to be a bit loud all hours of the day. But with time, they all settle down and right into their new lives. They get adopted and they leave and Johnny doesn’t hear from them again. 

Except Mark and he. Time goes by, adoption days come, and though people look their way, Johnny makes sure they see a different way. Because there is  _ no way _ they are taking Mark from him. His sweet, innocent little Mark, a bit too naive and certainly too clingy. Johnny watches him color, sitting at the table on the floor, cross-legged, both hands scribbling at once, different colors in each. He thinks about how Mark learned to do that on his own and how they--the Doctors, the Elders--noticed it after some time. Mark is constantly teaching himself new things. And that’s what Johnny likes about him.

“Hyung,” he nudges Johnny with a socked foot, “yellow, please.”

“Hm?” he hadn’t been paying much attention, too busy spacing out at Mark’s thick hair on his round little head to focus.

“Yellow crayon, please,”

Mark is always so polite.

“Here,” Johnny grabs the yellow crayon from the bucket of crayons he’s closest to. “What’cha drawing?”

“Lions, sun, grass, flowers. A bee. Or two.”

“Draw two bees. Or the other bee will be lonely,” Johnny smiles. 

Mark’s voice is so soft and gentle, just like he is, and a little high. But it’s all natural. Johnny’s is deeper and he refuses-- _ refuses _ \--to use any of the babyish vocabulary that he’d been forced to learn. Mark does, still. Whether it’s a preference or it’s because it’s the only words he  _ has _ available to him, he doesn’t know. Johnny doesn’t, and Mark has those extra words available to him through Johnny and association, but he knows Mark spends more time with the Doctors and the Elders than he ever did. They probably force that language onto him and he’s most likely gotten used to it. 

“Bees sleep together holding legs. Like holding hands, but it’s their legs,” Mark says, not looking up from where he’s scribbling a bee onto the page. Johnny spots the shorter, broken yellow crayon beside the paper, and guesses that it must’ve snapped. Mark sometimes doesn’t know his own strength.

“Like tangling legs? Like we do when you get too comfy?” Johnny asks, going to tickle the back of Mark’s neck. Mark shrieks and shrugs Johnny off with a shoulder.

“Stop! It’s ticklish!”

“Yeah? It tickles?” Johnny does it again and Mark whines, falling over into his lap. His hands paw at Johnny’s tummy for a moment. 

“I don’t like that,” Mark says, looking up at Johnny upside down in his lap with those round, glassy eyes that hold  _ galaxies _ within them. Sweet, pretty galaxies like the milky way, strong, deep galaxies like the Andromeda. Johnny knows those eyes can see it all.

“I’m sorry, I won’t do it again. No more neck tickles, yeah?”

“Yeah, no more,” Mark’s thumb traces his bottom lip for a moment and Johnny knows he’s struggling on whether or not he wants to suck his thumb. He’ll never belittle Mark for that, or for any of his other Little behaviors or tendencies. He’s not mean, nor is he cruel. He just . . . doesn’t do that himself. Johnny is a ‘big kid’. But Mark is still young, in this mindset, and he will nurture him all he can. To grow? Maybe. To embrace him? Always. 

“Okay, no more neck tickles. Do you wanna sit up and finish your drawing before one of the Elder Sisters comes back? You gotta color the whole page.”

“Mmm,” Mark seems to be thinking about it. He doesn’t suck his thumb. Instead, he pushes himself up and grabs the yellow crayon and starts to finish his drawing. He’s getting better and better everyday with practice. His fine motor skills are pretty good, average, and his reflexes are even better. He holds the crayon a little weird but that’s just how he writes. His handwriting is a little sloppy but he’s got time to get better with it. He’s quick to react to things, whether it be a crayon rolling off of the table, or someone going to reach for him. Johnny doesn’t know if he’ll connect those dots to relate it to his past life. He’s not sure. 

Johnny’s own skills are good, his handwriting neat but big, and he’s been writing and reading since the day after he woke up. Mark had taken a little longer, but they’re both where they should be, average, and pretty equal in all things said. They all have their strengths and weaknesses as all humans do, but it only takes a few days to a week to catch up on these things. Johnny thinks that it’s muscle memory, which brings up more questions than it answers. They need time to readjust to their new bodies, bodies he’s not sure are  _ theirs _ to begin with. Maybe they are. He doesn’t know how it happens or why it happens. They won’t and don’t tell anyone. And having to relearn a grown body? It’s frustrating, but they all start somewhere. 

Mark startles when there’s excitement outside of the playroom, a few other littles pausing to stop and listen. There’s an anxiety that hisses into the air in the sudden stillness after sudden noise. It makes sense. Everyone here is usually holding their breath when they first start off, or when they’re just about to leave. Excitement is not good. It creates chaos and the Elders do not like chaos. But then again, they think Johnny is chaos, and all Johnny does is talk.

Talk nonsense and conspiracies but talk nonetheless.

“What’s going on?” Johnny speaks up, the oldest one in the room mentally and physically besides the Elder that lurks about. The Elder standing by, on her knees playing with a little girl Johnny barely knows the name of, doesn’t have a chance to answer. She opens her mouth to speak, her brows knitted together in what Johnny  _ knows _ is annoyance, but she’s cut off when Yongie comes into the room, running in excitement. Running isn’t allowed unless it’s outside in the yard and even then, running is still quietly frowned upon. Johnny barely runs.

“Xuxi!”

They all frown but before Johnny can say anything, Yongie rushes over to the coloring table, landing a little too hard on his knees to have been comfortable. “Xuxi came with his mommy to visit! He’s downstairs!”

“Taeyongie!” The Elder goes to grab him by the back of the sweater to scold him before he can run off again because Yongie is  _ fast _ , her thick skirt bustling around her. Johnny feels his mouth go dry at the sudden drop of the name. Xuxi. Xuxi. He feels his heart pound when she bends down to give Yongie a gentle reminder not to run and not to yell, and how this is supposed to be quiet time. Yongie never listens, and Johnny knows that. A quick eyeroll when the Elders turn their heads, a tongue stuck out between his teeth. Johnny knows the whole feel. Yongie is younger than both of them and he’s still learning but he came with a truckload of sass that has yet to be mentored out of him. Johnny likes it.

“But Xuxi”--

“You can tell us quietly, Taeyongie,” she smiles a reassuring smile that would make Johnny feel better if his stomach wasn’t  _ churning _ . Xuxi. Xuxi, his old bed neighbor, his old . . . what? Friend? Had they been friends? They’d passed over at similar times, helped each other learn to rewrite and reread and Johnny always made Xuxi laugh, a little too loud, especially during bed time. But Johnny talked too much, just as he did now. And soon after, Xuxi was tired of hearing it. Sighs turned into a pillow over his ears at bedtime and soon the pillows turned into pushes and shoulder nudges. Smiles faded, kind eyes turned cold, and the day he left Xuxi didn’t take one look back at Johnny. He left with his mommies and never said a word to Johnny. No goodbye, no sorry, no mean words for him even. He’d just . . . 

Left.

And it was all Johnny’s fault.

Mark takes a look over at Johnny but he can barely hear the “hyung” that comes out of his mouth. Johnny pushes himself up, looking from everyone at the coloring table towards the door, and only manages a small ‘please’. The Elder nods and Johnny rushes downstairs as politely as he can, terrified that this chance will be stolen from him like his previous life. The stairwell to the playroom is a bit too spiral for his taste but at that moment he is ever so grateful for it, because he descends so slowly that he has enough time to spy down into the main hall and freeze. It  _ is _ Xuxi. Yongie isn’t a liar, he never was, but sometimes he doesn’t make the most sense. Babies don’t always. But Johnny continues down, his heart too big for his chest, and he chokes on it when he sees his old friend in all his golden glory. His sunkissed skin beautiful from the sun’s tan, his hair neatly combed back, wearing a long cream colored shirt that tucks into his jeans. Xuxi was always a ‘big kid’ like Johnny, and that’s why they spent so much time together. They played together, ate together, and did their activities together. 

Until Xuxi didn’t anymore, his cold and alienating behavior towards Johnny quite apparent. They didn’t use words like  _ hate _ in their home but Johnny wasn’t dense. He knew Xuxi hated him, or had begun to. He’d cut him off, ignored him, pushed him around whenever he had tried asking the same questions he rambled on to Mark about. And then he had left soon before Mark had shown up. Johnny had been angry and hurt but wounds could never last in his new body.

Johnny gets to the bottom of the stairs, stepping off onto the floor, watching Xuxi hug a few of the younger Littles hello. An Elder stands nearby, older than the rest, keeping a watchful eye focused on all of them. She looks to Johnny for only a moment before looking back to Xuxi. He takes one step closer to Xuxi, who’s just finished hugging someone, pulling back. His eyes find Johnny’s figure, not his own eyes, just him and he stills for a moment. They lock eyes. 

Xuxi smiles.

“Johnny!”

In a moment of disbelief, he rushes over to Johnny, who takes a step back. Why is he suddenly being so nice? Why is he smiling? Why is he acting like they’re old friends (they were)? Why isn’t he pushing Johnny, or punching him, or calling him mean names? Is it because the Elder is nearby, and he can’t? Is it because the other Littles are watching? Johnny stills himself when Xuxi extends an arm out.

“Can I hug you? Is that okay? I wanna . . .” Xuxi cuts himself off and Johnny thinks that he’s done it on purpose. It sounds childish a bit, but Johnny can tell that it’s not. To an Elder, it sounds like a silly, immature “want”. To Johnny, it sounds like . . . Xuxi wants something. He wants to . . . what?

“Yes,” Johnny replies in a faint whisper. He’ll take his chances. A suckerpunch to the gut, a jab to the ribs, a dig of the nails to his shoulder. He’ll take that chance, if only to figure out what it is Xuxi wants. 

Having been given permission, Xuxi leans in and goes to hug Johnny, pulling him a little closer than expected. Tighter maybe. Johnny feels himself about to push Xuxi off of him, overwhelmed by the anxiety of the sudden change in his ex-friend’s (friend’s?) behavior when Xuxi speaks, voice breathy and hot in his ear, barely audible to him.

“Johnny. You were  _ right _ .”

Johnny pulls away. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Johnny and Mark are brothers here and not a ship!

**Author's Note:**

> CuriousCat: @autumnacorns  
> Twitter: @autumnacorns


End file.
